Americana: Safety Be Dammed

Residents of arid Littlerock, Calif, (pop. 1,500), a farm community
northeast of Los Angeles, have a choice of potential disasters. Would
they rather risk being drowned, or drying up and blowing away? State
officials want to drain the 521 million-gal, reservoir behind the
nearby Littlerock Dam, whose water irrigates the peach and pear groves
and melon fields that give the town what little prosperity it has. But
the 53-year-old dam sits virtually atop the San Andreas Fault. Although
the structure has survived severe tremors in the past, seismologists
say it is located where...